Any feedback on the Captain Crush Grain Mill?

[mjdonnelly68]

I am having lots of problems with our clubs new Captain Crush. This is the second one. When the first one Refused to feed we just assumed it was a defective mill. Mainly because the design quality seems so good. New mill is in and attached to our 180 RPM gear motor. 77 lb to grind and the first 50 was smooth sailing. Then it refused to feed again. When we can get it to feed its letting lots whole grain through. I noticed that the plastic feels warm. Could it be warping? I am rather frustrated!

I'm having the same problem.

The mill worked fine the first couple of times I used it. The last time I went to use it, the mill would grind a bit and then just spin. I fussed around with it for an hour and was finally able to get through my 30lbs of grain. If I had to guess I would say that the gap between rollers was not even, and that was causing one roller to jam.

I suggest you get yourself some feeler gauges and make sure that the top rollers are adjusted so you have the same gap on either end.

I'm going to contact Northern Brewer in case my problem persists. Other than this last brew day I have been very happy with the CC and I have complete confidence in Northern Brewer. Their customer service has always been top-shelf.

Let me know how you make out (and I'll do the same).

 

[BrewBQ1]

IF you have not done so get in contact with NB and see if they can help before spending money on another mill.

I did do this and have no complaints with NB they tried to help and then sent another mill quickly. It did exactly the same thing. I personally believe there is a design flaw some where that they will just need to find.

 

[BierMuncher]

The problems with high volume jobs seem consistent enough that NB should have discovered these through rigorous testing. Polished good looks are no substitute for durability.

 

[lhd7osc]

I'm glad this thread is here. I too am having the stopping after 3lbs of grain milled. I'm going to go home and check my setting. I've read through the instructions again. But it's frustrating to take 30 mins - 1 hour to grind through grain. At $300, it should make the beer for me!!

 

[BungBrewing]

Have any of you Captain Crush owners posted reviews on Northern Brewer's website on this item? There's still only four reviews and all of those reviews gave it five out of five stars. Maybe if they get more feedback, they will be able to better address issues the owners have. (I hope they're not suppressing less-favorable reviews.)

(FYI: I was waiting for a while to see if I could get a Rebel Mill, but have long since given up on them. In the mean time I have been reading comments on other mills, and will probably end up with a MM2-2.0...)

 

[lhd7osc]

I have not. In fact, yesterday I took my mill apart to ‘really’ clean it. I did find a lot gunk built up on the rollers....so, I’ll do a few more mills before I give them a full review.

 

[BrewBQ1]

I did but it has not shown up

 

[BungBrewing]

I did but it has not shown up

Was is a negative review? I wonder if they are supressing anything but positive reviews...

 

[NeoBrew]

Well, I had some good and some bad with my brew day this weekend. I believe I figured out part of the clogging up problem. I think I had too big of a difference in the gap of the upper and lower rollers. I was crushing pretty tight with the lower roller for BIAB. (.023") I had the upper roller pretty wide, it just cracked the grains. This weekend I tightened up the upper roller to do a little tighter crush. Thus seems to have made it work well. I got through all 14 lbs without incident.

I'm not sure if it was additional pressure on the upper roller, or something else, but when. I got done there was a small pile of bronze below the drive roller. I wasn't happy about this. To add insult to injury, later in my brew day I knocked the thing over from on top of a bucket and the base plate cracked. So that part is official, the plastic will break.

Today I took it in to Northern Brewer here. We discussed the bushing problem and found that the rollers were not parallel when the settings said they should be. They replaced the whole mill without any reservation. We opened a new one and found it did not have the same alignment problem. I am very comfortable that they want to put out a good product and will stand behind what they sell.

I'm a very happy customer as of today. I'll repost in a few weeks when I brew again and let you know how the new one performs.



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[mjdonnelly68]

Just wanted to update my previous post.

Before I start, I just want to say that throughout my issues with the Captain Crush Grain Mill, Northern Brewer's customer service was top notch. When I started having issues with my CC, they worked with me to troubleshoot the problem. When the problem persisted, they sent me another CC to try and had me keep the original CC in case I needed parts. When I had the same problem with the second CC Mill (the rollers would not spin freely). They accepted the mill back for a full refund AND gave me a gift certificate for my trouble. NB has been fantastic throughout the whole process.

That being said, I returned the Captain Crush and purchased a Monster Mill 2-Roller grain mill.

I could never get the Captain Crush to work properly. The fact that I had the same problem with two brand new mills really shook my confidence in the product. While trouble shooting, I also found the build quality to be very questionable. The 'adjustable' rollers fell apart easily and did not seem to be up to the task.

In all fairness to NB, it may be that a 3-roller mill may be more finicky in regards to the gaps and set up - and that may have been a contributing factor. But I don't think that a high end mill aimed at a consumer market should require a degree in engineering to operate.

The Monster Mill 2-roller mill I purchased worked like a charm right out of the gate.

For those folks trying to choose between the Captain Crush and the MM3 - my advice would be to purchase the MM2. I truly believe that the complexity inherent to the 3-roller mill is not worth it for non-commercial use.

Good luck!

 

[govner1]

FWIW- I have a MM-3 that I motorized using a Power Grinder set up. Setting the gap could not have been easier & the crush has been consistently great. The third roller hasn't been an issue since it is basically stationary in position.
All the credit for the cabinet build goes to a brew buddy!!


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[Brettomomyces]

What grinder did you use to motorize your MM3? I'm looking at getting an MM3 and that looks like a great, relatively simple setup.

 

[govner1]

check out:
http://www.allamericanaleworks.com

 

[Brettomomyces]

Awesome, thanks for the heads up.

 

[govner1]

You'll also need to order two Lovejoys w/ appropriate diameter openings for each shaft & a spider to go between them. Also, the motor shaft is metric and is keyed.


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[MNDan]

For those folks trying to choose between the Captain Crush and the MM3 - my advice would be to purchase the MM2. I truly believe that the complexity inherent to the 3-roller mill is not worth it for non-commercial use.

Good luck!

I agree 100%. I have the MM 2 2.0 with the new "wheel" gap adjustors and it is amazing! The bigger rollers are what really makes the difference in its ability to pull grain through and crush perfectly, and I see no reason to add complexity with the 3-roller version. The crush on the 2 2.0 is spot on IMHO and the large rollers are going to perform WAY longer that any smaller rollers.

I wore out a Barley Crusher to the point where it wouldn't pull grain through anymore due to small rollers and worn knurls. I think even with worn knurls the MM 2 2.0 will still pull grain and crush great. As they say, the perfect grain mill would have HUGE rollers and they would be smooth.

 

[sjporr]

I just purchased a Captain Crunch for my HBS Store and I'm having nothing but trouble with it so far. The flat spots in the bottom of the hopper are a pain because they leave grain behind from the previous run, one of the set screws have already loosened up and fell out. None of the set screw will stay tight if you do as instructed. You have to lock them down or they will work loose and fall out. The free rollers continue to just jam up. I'm hoping that it's a speed issue right now that I have to correct. But for the price I paid this unit should definitely work much better then it does. I'm not happy at all.

 

[bobo31]

My advice would be to return the captain crush asap. My wife bought me one last Christmas and after battling with it for a month or two I finally gave up and returned it. I ended up getting the Monster Mill 2. 2.0 and have been very happy with it. Super simple to use and the CC doesn't even compare to the quality of the MM.

 

[sjporr]

So tonight I tried one last thing. I motorized the Captain Crush with a large pulley and a 1725 RPM motor. I thought that I had my speed ratio wrong. I was a little fast running at 250 RPM so I decided to get a low speed (variable) high torque drill and mount it. That way it would run as designed and I could try different speeds. This too was a huge failure. No matter what I do to this mill it will not mill grains consistently. I've given up and am now asking for my money back!

 

[RLinNH]

What a great thread!!! I have had my Schmidling Malt Mill for what seems like forever now. I have gone through 2 sets of rollers, but it still does the job that it was intended to do. Although, I am looking to buy a new mill as the rollers on my mill are starting to get worn. I really wanted either the NB CC or the MM 3 roller, but after reading this thread, I'm off to order a MM 2, 2.0 right now. I don't need the complexity, headaches, nor do I want to purchase a new drill to run my grain mill. Once again, awesome read here for anyone that has not read the entire thread.

 

[JasonU]

I just spent 90 minutes trying to crush 22 lbs of grain with my Captain Crush and decided that was enough of trying to make it work.

Did some searching here to see what I should get to replace my CC, and came across this thread. I'm on my second CC and have had nothing but problems from the start. I have to say NB was great about replacing it, but they seemed to be mystified by my feed issues, and acted as though I was the first customer to ever have this problem.

Looks like I'll be ordering a MM2 2.0.

 

[NeoBrew]

I went through three of them. NB happily replaced each one. Each had different issues, but all were roller related. I really liked the features, but after the third one failed on the first use, I said enough was enough. Picked up a Monster Mill. NB customer service was above and beyond, but I can't recommend the CC.

 

[kiari_dogo]

I've had quite the mixed experience with the CC so far; however, I can safely say that now I am extremely happy with my purchase. My first hopper and second hopper slightly chipped, but I fixed the second with some super glue.

This mill has a learning curve. Like others in this thread, I struggled at first. I labored over 12 lbs of grain for an hour. It would feed and then stop continually. Before completely giving up on it, I did the following:

1) Found this thread and got more frustrated.
2) Completely took my CC apart. After cleaning and drying it thoroughly, I put it back together and completely re-read the instruction page that came with it.

My next crush was my best yet. I realized I was setting the crush setting too small and that was leaving grain to get stuck in between the second and third roller, which caused the second roller to not catch. I am now extremely happy with my CC and even got 78% efficiency on a BIAB brew this morning. Moral of the story is this thing is finicky but take the time to learn it and the CC is a great mill, regardless if, in my experience, the plastic is a bit fragile.

 

[MtnSoul]

My next crush was my best yet. I realized I was setting the crush setting too small and that was leaving grain to get stuck in between the second and third roller, which caused the second roller to not catch. I am now extremely happy with my CC and even got 78% efficiency on a BIAB brew this morning. Moral of the story is this thing is finicky but take the time to learn it and the CC is a great mill, regardless if, in my experience, the plastic is a bit fragile.

Hi - am currently trouble--shooting my CC. I contacted NB and their customer service resolved to send me 4 new set screws and told me not to over tighten them and take it apart and clean the whole thing.

Please, share the setting you currently are using on your CC that gave you 78% efficiency and a nice, problem free, crush!!!

 

[MtnSoul]

These were my set screws after I removed them for inspection. View attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1455245473.662473.jpg

 

[MtnSoul]

Got my new screws from NB and installed them. When using my hand to free spin the third roller I noticed that it would catch at the same point in rotation and then free up indicating bad alignment. Once installing the new set screws and making sure all the knobs were symmetric with bilaterally it spun freely. Looking forward to grinding some grain on Thursday AM. I'll report back then

 

[kiari_dogo]

First roller: second to last setting.
Second Roller: third to last setting.

Both the left and right adjustment knobs need to be on the exact same setting. Only one side of each roller locks into position, leaving the other somewhat loose. Sometimes, maybe twice in a crush, the lower roller knob that is loose looses positions. I believe it does so in order to relieve pressure generated by a particularly tight crush -- perhaps the mill would break if it did not so. Fixing the issue is easy: just re-tighten that one knob. Milling ~12lbs takes about 10-15 minutes for me.

 

[MtnSoul]

Are you defining the "last setting" as the smallest or largest? It would be easier to see a picture... I guess

 

[63belair]

First roller: second to last setting.
Second Roller: third to last setting.

Both the left and right adjustment knobs need to be on the exact same setting. Only one side of each roller locks into position, leaving the other somewhat loose. Sometimes, maybe twice in a crush, the lower roller knob that is loose looses positions. I believe it does so in order to relieve pressure generated by a particularly tight crush -- perhaps the mill would break if it did not so. Fixing the issue is easy: just re-tighten that one knob. Milling ~12lbs takes about 10-15 minutes for me.

10-15 minutes?

Is that including measuring grain and setting up the mill, or just the actual grinding time?

 

[kiari_dogo]

Last setting as the largest.

Depending on how much grain and different varieties, I could imagine measuring and grinding on taking ~15 minutes. I was referring to just grinding before.

In terms of "setting up the mill", all you have to do is place a the mill on top of a bucket. I don't take it apart after each mill. It cleans very easily -- either outside with spray from a hose or a quick rinse in a sink.